Rep. Geoff Davis (KY) published his weekly column recently. See an excerpt of the piece, which discusses job loss in America. Check ou an excerpt here:
February marks the one year anniversary of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s unprecedented trillion-dollar stimulus package, which was signed into law by President Barack Obama on February 17, 2009.
The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (H.R. 1) was rushed through the House and Senate on the promise that it would immediately jumpstart our economy and “save or create” up to four million jobs. The legislation was promoted as “timely, targeted and temporary” – providing the economy with a necessary “jolt” to spur job creation. Democrat leaders promised the American people that, with their stimulus package, unemployment would not rise above eight percent.
At the time the bill was signed into law, the national unemployment rate stood at 7.6 percent nationwide and 8.7 percent in Kentucky. A total of 13 million Americans were unemployed. Now, one year later, the national unemployment rate has risen to 9.7 percent and more than sixteen million Americans are unemployed. Kentuckians have struggled with unemployment rates above ten percent since May 2009.Rather than saving or creating three million jobs, nearly 3.3 million net American jobs have been lost since the stimulus became law last year. An additional one million Americans have become so frustrated with the state of the economy that they have simply given up entirely on looking for new job opportunities.
